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So about the way David affected me-and he did affect o, it wasn&039;t supposed to be very adventurous; Moht our tickets, Cokes, and popcorn, wished o shopping

Jientleman that he slapped ainst the basic principles of gentleed not to smack him back We seated ourselves in the theater with snacks and drinks, sat stiffly next to each other, and prayed for the lights to go down so ouldn&039;t have to fuh too much conversation We exhausted the bad points of Mrs Walker, the lish teacher, and Mr Zapruzinski, the boy&039;s gyarettes, and there weren&039;t any girl-boy subjects either of us felt competent to attempt

We had just added the band teacher to our hts went down Way down Like, out And outside, the stor its fist for three hours

let me have it Oh, yeah It was pissed off Thunder roared so loudly, I thought ere already watching Star Wars As I sat there in the dark with a bunch of shrieking preteens and a few panicked adults and my (literally) blind date Jimmy, I heard rain hary mob It was a riot stors were bad and going to get worse

Jimmy tried to kiss me It was a panicked, sweaty attempt, and he missed and smacked his forehead into o with the roar, and then he corrected and got his lips on mine and-

Oh

Well

That wasn&039;t so bad He sat back quickly when the house lights flickered on again and looked triumphant As well he should I felt-curious Warm all over, especially in the o," I said hesitantly to Ji kids like frightened sheep, a few teens slouching away and trying to look cool and uncaring and maybe a little bit to blame for all the uproar

"You want to go?" he asked He really was kind of nice, I decided Dark hair, thick and straight, pale blue eyes, and long soft lashes, sensitive looking We were the last two left in the theater, with hail ha the door

Ji nonchalance "Want some popcorn?"

It was my first try at seduction It succeeded

Jimmy reached over and kissed me, more enthusiasm than skill, and we spilled popcorn all over the sticky theater floor, and my war boil This kissing thing, this was fun It went on for a while, and I guess the stor attention, and Jiine in hts flickered again and went out I was grateful

Jimmy&039;s hand moved, and my nipple went hard, and in that moment I think I even would have let him put his hand down my pants, except that at that particular instant, the roof of the theater peeled open, shedding ceiling tiles and metal struts and cement

I screa cold, and hard little nuggets of ice spat out of the dark and shattered on the concrete floor, stuck to the purple plush velvet, stung like wasps on my exposed arms and face Jimmy put his arn

The wind howled like a knife-wielding olf ball hit Jih to make him yelp, and I wrenched away fros: "Hey! Stop it!"

I looked up into the heart of it, this angry te I had into the scream I shoved at it with muscles in my head that I&039;d never really exercised

"I mean it! Quit!"

A ball of ice the size of a soda can s me with shrapnel I drew in breath for a third scream No need

It stopped

Silent Dead still Overhead, clouds lazily rotated like a watch running down Lightning laced in and out of the edges

Raindrops pattered on the ruined roof Thunderhard, hard and fast as a rock &039;n&039; roll dru sound and run for the door

The clouds rotated again I looked right into the hard dark center of it and it looked back, and we understood each other, I guess I sat down on a cold, wet seat and looked at the movie screen that would never show ed rip down the ain

I wasn&039;t sure if David reminded me of that divine burst of first lust, or the terror of knowing I no longer controlled ly suspected it was both

By the time David woke up, ere in Battle Ground, Indiana, and I was pulled over to the side of the road and doing a little car maintenance on a stubborn air filter It left rimier than before, and I sla David peacefully snoring in my ear was just about more than I could stand

He ca neat and self-satisfied

"Good ," I said "We&039;ve been on the road for about nine hours, and we&039;re-"

"Outside of Battle Ground, Indiana," he said "I know"

I&039;d turned the GPS off, so he didn&039;t get it off the con "And you know this-"

"You missed the part where I admitted I was a Djinn?"

"C&039;htly "I haven&039;t been co us unseeable"

"As opposed to invisible?"

"Unseeable just means that people don&039;t look at you, not that they can&039;t see you It takes less effort"

"I thought you were asleep"

"We don&039;t sleep the sa us unseeable doesn&039;t require ed "I suppose in the co syste question "How h, anyway?"

He shook his head I&039;d have to ask two ht answer, and frankly, it wasn&039;t worth the wasted breath I was tired and cranky, and I needed food I was also wishing he&039;d toldearlier, because I would have felt safe enough to park and grab a Big Gulp and cheese crackers froht have decided to try a drive-through fast food place and they probably wouldn&039;t even have noticedabout pizza," I said "Deep dish, lots of cheese, o style around here Wait, I don&039;t suppose that&039;s one of the handy cool tricks you can do, is it?"

"Make pizza?" He gave it serious thought "No I can&039;t create so, at least not while I&039; as what I made it from contained some of the same elements"

"Like?"

"Toh I&039;et pepperoni"

"I think you start with a pig, but let&039;s not get too far into that Man, what I&039;d give for a Moon Pie right about now"

David turned and looked around in the backseat; I could have told hiable food were sli I&039;d never really been able to do, as much as I loved Delilah I tended to accumulate slips of paper, receipts, scribbled directions, paper wrappers fro, I remembered it "Hey, I think she left a therood"

He didn&039;t see it I leaned back and spotted a silver gleaer seat, just about popped a vertebra rooting it out, and caoods I was just about to check it for caffeine content when David said, "Do you feel that?"

I forgot all about caffeine The jolt of adrenaline went straight to led in every soft tissue on my body I put the ther up "Don&039;t get out of the car"